Part 26 (1/2)

”All very well,” said Percy to himself, as he stumbled forward on his cramped limbs; ”they'll have to give me a leg up if they want me to go the pace. Where are we going to next, I'd like to know?”

”Come, stir yourself,” said the man again, accompanying his words by a rough shake.

Percy responded by toppling over on his face. He who knew the way to swim against stream ten miles an hour, was just now unable to walk half a dozen paces on solid ground.

”Best shove him in the sack again,” growled the other man.

The bare mention of that sack startled poor Percy to his feet. If he might only have spoken he could easily have explained the trifling difficulty which prevented his ”stepping out.” As it was, all he could do was to struggle forward bravely for a few more paces, and then again fall. The men seemed to perceive that there was something more than mere playfulness in this twice-repeated performance, and solved the difficulty by clutching him one under each arm, and materially a.s.sisting his progress by dragging him.

Any of Percy's acquaintances would have been greatly shocked had they been privileged to witness this triumphal midnight progress across the moors; his dragging legs feebly trying to imitate the motions of walking, but looking much more like kneeling, his head dropped forward on his chest, his shoulders elevated by the grip of his conductors under his pinioned arms, and his eyes bandaged as never a blind-man's-buff could bind them.

It was a long weary march that; but to Percy it was luxury compared with the morning among the flies on the hut floor. His conductors settled into a jog-trot, which the light weight of the boy did not much impede; and Percy, finding the motion not difficult, and on the whole soothing, dropped off into a half-doze, which greatly a.s.sisted in pa.s.sing the time.

At length, however, he became aware of a halt and a hurried consultation between his captors.

”Is he there? Whistle?”

Corporal gave a low whistle, which after a second or two was answered from the hill-side.

”That's all right!” said the other, in tones of relief. ”See anything of the cart?”

Corporal peered round in the darkness.

”Yes--all right down there.”

”Come on, then. Keep your eye on Jim, though, he's a mighty hand at going more than his share.”

”Trust me,” growled Corporal.

Then Percy felt himself seized again and dragged forward.

In about five minutes they halted again, and the whistle was repeated.

The answer came from close at hand this time.

”All square?” whispered Corporal.

”Yes!” replied a new indistinct voice--”come on.”

”Jim's screwed again,” said the other man; ”I can tell it by his voice; there's no trusting him. Come on.”

They had moved forward half a dozen steps more, when Corporal suddenly found his head enveloped in a sack--a counterpart of his own--while at the same moment the other man was borne to the ground with a great dog's fangs buried in his neckcloth.

”Hold him!” called Jeffreys to the dog, as he himself applied his energies to the subjugation of the struggling Corporal.

It was no easy task. But Jeffreys, lad as he was, was a young Samson, and had his man at a disadvantage. For Corporal, entangled with the sack and unprepared for the sudden onslaught, staggered back and fell; and before he could struggle to his feet Jeffreys was on him, almost throttling him. It was no time for polite fighting. If Jeffreys did not throttle his man, his man, as he perfectly well knew, would do more than throttle him. So he held on like grim death, till Corporal, half smothered by the sack and half-choked by his a.s.sailant's clutch, howled for quarter.

Then for the first time Jeffreys felt decidedly perplexed. If he let Corporal go, Corporal, not being a man of honour, might turn on him and make mincemeat of him. If, on the other hand, he called the dog off the other man to hold Corporal while he bound him captive, the other man might abuse his opportunity in a like manner. The boy was evidently too exhausted to take any part in the encounter? What could he do?